Outsider
by Tom
Summary: A Young Enzo fic. Sort of about being the "new guy in the system." Please read & review.


Author's note: This one takes place just after the restart. For all you Young Enzo fans out there...

Outsider

Part I

Strummin' Strings

The crowd in Mainframe's cavernous Grand Hall roared with applause and laughter as the Mainframe Strolling Players cavorted across the stage in a side-splitting reenactment of their battle with Megabyte. Dot laughed so hard tears began flowing down her face, Bob slipping an arm around her shoulders and laughing as well as he watched the binome playing him crash down to the stage in a slip-up he guessed wasn't one of the many featured in the script. He had to laugh; the acting was just so _bad_ he couldn't help it. And the script! Bob burst out laughing in a part that wasn't even funny, remembering something the Enzo binome had done awhile back. Sprites and binomes looked over at the pair in confusion, wondering if somehow they'd all missed something. 

For Dot, at least, it was a release. All the tension, all the pent-up anger and rage she'd accrued during the hours-long battle with the evil virus evaporated in one explosive laughter-filled evening. After all, even the Command.com was entitled to a little fun in life. Another round of chuckles erupted as the binome playing Megabyte was "defeated". Dot had to wipe a tear away as the curtain swung closed to a thunderous standing ovation. All around, sprites and binomes alike were slapping each other on the back and congratulating each other, the show a welcome end to an old era and the beginning of a new age, promising peace and prosperity to all the citizens of Mainframe. 

Few noticed, however, the one sprite who _wasn't_ laughing or clapping or celebrating the miraculous restart like everyone else was. Indeed, one might say, the restart had ruined his life, replacing everyone and everything he once knew with something... different. While Dot and Bob broke into a spontaneous embrace, tears of laughter and joy mirrored in each other's eyes, tears of bleak despair ran down Enzo's face as he took in the crowd celebrating the single event that had taken away everyone and everything he thought he knew. If this... "production" of all the events that had taken place prior to the reboot had any truth at all to it, it wasn't even that funny. Half the gags in this strange performance seemed to involve Enzo in one way or another, and all the mistakes he'd made during the long battle with Megabyte. 

It wasn't even fair! Every sprite and binome in Mainframe was packed into the Grand Hall, laughing at _him_ for stuff he hadn't even done. He cast a sidelong glance at the cause of all his problems. The big green guy just sat there, totally oblivious, laughing along with everyone else. He wasn't even smart enough to realize that they were laughing at _him_! Enzo glared at the bulky renegade. With all the mistakes he'd made "defending" the system, it was amazing that there was still a system left to defend! For a moment, Enzo wondered what would have happened had this future _not_ occurred, if the lucky fluke of the restart had not saved them all. Would he have been deleted? Or would he still be blissfully unaware of everything that had apparently taken place, in another time, another _life_ that he knew and still desperately longed for? 

Either way, everything could still have been avoided if Matrix hadn't been making mistakes _like usual_ and left his icon in game sprite mode, ensuring that Enzo was stripped suddenly of everything he'd known and trapped here in this dark future, all in the space of a single brilliant flash of green energy. That brought on other questions Enzo wasn't even prepared to deal with. For example: what _was_ he? Had he truly been alive in that other timeline he remembered, really experienced everything he thought had happened- or were the memories artificial, created by the restart in a bizarre attempt to return things to the way they had been? Enzo didn't know... and at the moment, he didn't care. Everyone was so different- Bob, and Dot, and all the others, even AndrAIa. 

His rage subsided for a moment, replaced with a sudden, bitter sense of helplessness and longing. _AndrAIa..._ He saw her sitting there, obviously enjoying the performance like everyone else, Matrix's arm slung casually around her shoulders. The two seemed so happy together... and it was obvious even from his short time in the new Mainframe that these two were far from just friends. Tears of frustration clouded his view. Everything else, he could probably have handled... but this...

            One moment, he'd been lying next to her in a rare peaceful moment on a picnic blanket in Floating Point Park. Megabyte was still there, but they finally had him trapped behind the firewall in G-Prime. Enzo had seen it up close- _nothing _could penetrate that. Everything, for the moment at least, was the way it should be- maybe the way it always would have been, if it hadn't been for Megabyte. Bob and Dot had gone off for a walk together, and Mouse and Frisket seemed to be playing some sort of game together- he could hear her off in the distance shouting something that sounded like "Come back here with my katana!" It had been the perfect moment. He could see it mirrored in her eyes as well, her feelings for him. He'd just opened his mouth to say something maybe he shouldn't have, when _flash!_  

A paralyzing wave of green energy had struck, permeating his very code in an instant, sweeping him breathlessly along to destinations unknown- and when the afterimages had faded, he soon realized that nothing would ever be the same again. He looked up suddenly, realizing that the show had ended- but in an encore performance, spurred on by the crowd's cheers, Bob took center stage with a huge electric guitar, surrounded by a group of supporting binomes. Enzo stared. He hadn't seen Bob play since he'd turned 1.0... and his jam session with Megabyte had been one of the coolest moments in the young sprite's entire life. If he concentrated hard enough, it almost seemed as if he could bring that moment back, just one last time...

            But no. This was a different time, a different audience, even a different _Bob_- and no matter how hard he tried, Enzo couldn't convince himself otherwise. Despite the multitude of people around him, Enzo suddenly felt very alone. The cheering, thronging crowd was starting to make him feel nauseous. Standing, he pushed his way through the swarming, alien crowd and made his way to the outside aisle, where he started for the door. Bob's thundering guitar solo reverberated throughout the hall, and Enzo held a hand to his aching head and sighed. He needed some air.

            Dot pushed open the huge double doors of the Grand Hall, listening to the rain cascade down outside in the sudden silence. Behind her Bob brought his number to a smashing finish, the final chords hanging in the air as the audience looked on awestruck- then burst into spontaneous applause. She saw him there... apart from everyone, sheltering from the weather under the Grand Hall's dark green awning. "Enzo-" she started, then stopped when she saw his shoulders shaking. Everything about him seemed to ask only to be left alone. Bringing a hand to her face she turned, withdrawing, not wanting the boy to see her own tears. The crowd spilled out from the Principle Office, the celebration continuing into the streets, into the night even though the party in the Principle Office had ended. It was, after all, a time for celebration. For some...

            While others celebrated everything that had happened, Enzo mourned only for what was lost- for the friends, the life he had once known. "... talk to him..." he heard in his sister's voice, heartfelt sobs reaching his ears. Immune to it all, he sat, head in hands as he watched the raindrops fall from the heavens to break on the pavement below. _Like me_, he realized. _I'm breaking... tearing apart from the inside. Even though the others might not be able to see it, this new world is just too much for me, too sudden for me... I don't know if I can bear to live without you, AndrAIa._

            Vaguely, he was aware of strong arms lifting him up, carrying him away. "C'mon, squirt," the voice said. "Let's get you home." Bob... but not _his_ Bob. Not his sister, not his girlfriend, not his _world_. Everything seemed to be spinning endlessly in a swirling maelstrom of chaos and sorrow. The blackness rose, and he let it take him.

            When he woke up, blinking sleepily in the mid-afternoon glow, he was still there. Bob. He pushed himself up into a sitting position. Just where _was_ he, anyway? Shining rays of sunlit brilliance cascaded through the window, and looking out Enzo saw he was high up... probably at the 8 Ball Apartments. He looked over and saw Bob, a Guardian in every sense of the word, standing watch over him while he slept- and saw a look of concerned relief flash through the sprite's vision as their eyes met. "You slept a long time," he said. Enzo didn't respond, looking at the Guardian's face from a new angle... if it wasn't for the longer hair, it would look just like the Bob he knew. In a time that seemed all too long ago, even now...

            When Enzo didn't say anything, Bob shrugged and turned back to his former position. "We had to find something to do with you, you know," he said with a grin. "Matrix seemed to want his old room back, and we didn't know where to put you- so for today at least, you're with me." The Guardian's smile faltered for an instant as Enzo remained stubbornly silent. _That's what I am to them,_ he realized. _It's not just me. "We didn't know where to put you..." I'm an outsider. A stranger. Even to my "family", as strange as that is._

            Without a word, Bob picked up the acoustic guitar that lay propped against the wall and began strumming. Slowly, softly at first, steadily growing in rhythm and volume, he picked out a slow, happy sort of song Enzo had never heard before. His eyes widened. Even though he'd never heard it, it sounded somehow familiar... and somehow _right_ to him at that instant. He'd never heard the old Bob play like this- and for an instant, wondered if he'd had this talent all the time and just never showed this side of himself to anyone. 

Bob caught his slow smile and grinned back, bringing the song to a trailing close what seemed like hours later and standing. "C'mon- get dressed," he said, putting his guitar back into its case. "Today's a new day- we'll do whatever you want to do. Play jetball, go circuit racing-" he shrugged. "Get ready- I'll be back in a nano." He left, shutting the door to the apartment's only bedroom behind him. Enzo pushed himself out of bed, the rays of sunshine streaming through the window reflecting his current mood... hope. _Maybe it's not so bad,_ he told himself. _Maybe it doesn't matter if this Bob's older, or different from the Bob I knew- or any of the others, for that matter. Maybe it can all still turn out right..._

            Booting into his clothes, a ghost of a smile flashed across his face, echoing years gone by in a single flash and moments half remembered he knew he could never bring back. Maybe this whole thing would turn out just as bad as he'd thought it would... and then again, maybe not. He shrugged, cocking his cap to one side as he walked out of the room, deleting the light and letting the door fall shut behind him. After all, there was only one way to find out.

A/N: OK, after my short and slightly stupid ficlet on Daemon's invasion, I'm ready to jump back in here at fanfiction.net. With this fic I'm trying to make right all that went wrong with my chapter in ROM, and in _Enemy_ to some extent: as WMG pointed out to me earlier, I've been focusing too much on the action, and not adding enough description into the stuff I write. There _will _be action here, of course- but I'm trying to make this one good, so any comments or suggestions you might have would be genuinely appreciated. Look forward to new chapters here and with all of my Reboot fics soon, Tom.

PS- the title here comes from a great song on acidplanet.com created by some guy with Acid Music. For anyone who might care. For the rest of you- review this fic anyway!!! 


End file.
